Mad(ison) as Hell

As most of you know, Democratic state senators from Wisconsin have left the state to prevent Republicans from securing a quorum to vote on a bill that would decimate unions’ power to collectively bargain. As of February 26, the standoff continues.

I’m torn on this issue.

On the one hand, I totally agree with the goals of the senators. Whatever you think of unions today, working people from all walks of life would be significantly worse off without them. They’d be working longer hours for lower pay in awful conditions, and so would their children. The right to collectively bargain with their employers—whether those employers are in the public or private sphere—has been a boon to individuals’ lives and to local, state, and national economies.

Furthermore, the governor of Wisconsin has been shown to be duplicitous, venally manipulative, and beholden to corporate (and out-of-state) interests. He has used the cloak of “getting the state’s economy in shape” to hide his goal of busting the unions. Proof: The senators—and, for the most part, the unions—have already agreed to the Republicans’ economic demands; the only obstacle to their return and their vote is the collective-bargaining provision.

On the other hand, Wisconsin citizens voted in Republicans—the governor as well as the senators. The Republicans have a majority, and the way our system of democracy usually works is that the majority carry the day. In some circumstances, the minority can use strategies like filibustering or negotiating or even shame-by-media, but their job is to stay in the legislative chambers and somehow work it out. Whether or not it’s legal, and whether or not it’s been done before, leaving the state doesn’t seem to me to be an ethical response to being on the losing end of an issue.

Where does this end? Any time a party finds itself down in the vote, its members petulantly take off? That doesn’t seem to portend an effective way of governing.

Granted, the current situation seems to have bought Democrats time in which to mobilize. The issue has gone national, and protests have been held all around the country. I’m glad to see this, in that Labor with a capital L is often neglected in political discourse. It has been put at a serious disadvantage by recent court decisions and consequent influxes of money by corporations. So, to the extent that more people are aware of these issues and come out in support of the rights of working men and women, that’s a good thing.

But what happens next? Is this the best way of effecting—or preventing—change? Are there not more legitimate alternatives, such as voting out the ill-favored Republicans (if they are indeed ill-favored) at the next election and then repealing whatever harmful legislation they fostered? Are there judicial remedies?

If walking out is a legitimate strategy, why didn’t U.S. Senators walk out in protest of the invasion of Iraq, or the implementation of the PATRIOT Act, or any number of arguably more injurious legislative acts perpetrated during the Bush administration?

There are two issues here: One is of content—the dismantling of unions. The other is of process—the “legislative” strategy of running away from the vote. Each has ethical, moral, and possibly legal ramifications. Let me know what you think.